The Definitions of Piety Socrates meets with Euthyphro near the king-archon's court. Socrates explains that he is under indictment because he does not believe in the gods in whom the city does believe in and Euthyphro is present because he has come to persecute his own father for unintentionally killing a murderer. Socrates then flatter Euthyphro about his knowledge on holiness/piety. Out of curiosity Socrates questions Euthyphro about holiness. This leading into the definitions of piety.
Meanwhile messengers had been sent to Athens to inquire of the interpreters of religious concerning what should be done with the man. By the time the messengers returned the criminal had died from hunger and exposure. Euthyphro was willing to prosecute his father to cleanse himself and his family from the religious pollution caused by the murder. What is piety?” Socrates asked Euthyphro to answer. He asked Euthyphro this question to test his intellect and she if he is indeed as smart as he claims.
The second horn says that since God is on the side of something therefore it is considered to be right or pious. Now, Socrates and Euthyphro was follower of the first horn of dilemma. They both thought that since something is pious therefore God loves it. It is evident from the statement, “Socrates proposes to amend the definition, and say that 'what all the gods love is pious, and what they all hate is impious.' To this Euthyphro agrees” (Plato, 2008).
Reflection #1 Entry #1: Euthyphro In the Euthyphro, Socrates and Euthyphro are having a discussion about Euthyphro prosecuting his own father. Throughout their conversation, Socrates asks Euthyphro a lot of different questions trying to understand why Euthyphro is prosecuting his own father. Euthyphro defended himself by saying it is what is right, and that it doesn’t matter if the one is he prosecuting is a stranger or a relative, he is still a murderer. Euthyphro then gets into a discussion about what is holy and unholy, which Socrates has many questions about, but never gets a straight answer from Euthyphro. By the end of the story, Euthyphro says he has to be somewhere and just leaves Socrates, never fully answering his questions about what is holy.
Anytus shows his ignorance and unwillingness to accept Socrates’s teachings when Anytus tells Socrates that he has never even spoken to a Sophist or ever meeting one. Anytus states “Easily, for I know who they are, whether I have experience of them or not.” (Meno, 92C) This stubbornness is the same that helped convict Socrates and sentence him to death. Anytus shows his lack of wisdom by denying himself the ability to grow by admitting his wrongs. Meletus is just as stubborn as Anytus. The
One of the charges in the affidavit written by Meletus against Socrates is that he is an evil doer "corrupting the youth" (Grube). Another charge brought against Socrates is that he is making up new Gods and disregarding the old Gods the Athenians believe in (Grube). Socrates starts his defense by addressing the jury and telling them that his accusers had a prepared speech, while Socrates' speech will be completely improvised (Perel). Socrates continued to further disassociate himself from the opponents by telling the jury to forgive him for his conversational tone in his speech, for that is how he best speaks (Perel). Socrates asked the jury to focus on the substance of his defense, not how his defense is delivered.
In Euthyphro, a short dialogue by Plato, the character of Euthryphro suggests that a person or action is pious or morally right if the Gods agree with it and love it. The character of Socrates then raises a critical question: “Do the Gods love what is morally right because it is morally right or is it morally right because the Gods love it?” This question can also be put as, “does God command something because it is already right or is it right only because God commands it?” What makes this question important is that for the Divine Command Theory to be true, one of the two parts to this question must be accepted. But if either options of this question are accepted, then the logical conclusions seem to clash with other views that Divine Command Theorists may have. The first option implies that God loves or commands something because it is morally right. This would mean that God did not create morality but on the other hand recognized that something was already morally good and
This conception of morality provides the wrong reasons for moral principles. Going back to the child abuse example if God didn’t exist, child abuse wouldn’t be wrong. This is because if God wouldn’t be around to make abuse wrong. However, child abuse would still be malicious so it would still be wrong (Rachel’s and 50-53). Which makes this theory impossible to be right, second even god faring people don’t always agree with everything god states.
First, he states, “In that case it’s what’s lovable to the gods that’s pious, and what’s not lovable to them that’s impious” (13). Euthyphro makes a claim that piety means to be loved by the gods. Socrates questions how something that is god-loved is pious and something that is god-hated is impious. Afterwards, Socrates comes to a new definition of piety saying, “Is it where the just is that the pious is too, or is it that where the pious is, there too the just is, without there being the pious everywhere the just is-because the pious is part of the just” (21)? Here, the definition of piety changes from being loved by gods to being just Kajol 2 or fair.
What is sin? ” is addressed (5). Euthyphro’s dilemma is explained by Panos Dimas in his article when he says that if something is “loved by the gods….Socrates characterizes it as something that happens to it and therefore presupposes that the pious has already been constituted” (2). What this means is that we cannot be sure of what is good or bad because we do not know the real essence of what piety is. The basic question of the dilemma is: are morals considered ethical because the gods says so or do the gods say morals are ethical because they actually are?